Many companies package groups of items together for a variety of purposes, such as e-commerce and mail order companies that package items (e.g., books, CDs, apparel, food, etc.) to be shipped to fulfill orders from customers. Retailers, wholesalers, and other product distributors (which may collectively be referred to as distributors) typically maintain an inventory of various items that may be ordered by clients or customers. This inventory may be maintained and processed at a materials handling facility which may include, but is not limited to, one or more of: warehouses, distribution centers, cross-docking facilities, order fulfillment facilities, packaging facilities, shipping facilities, or other facilities or combinations of facilities for performing one or more functions of material (inventory) handling.
When customer orders are of variable size (e.g., when both item sizes and the quantity of items may vary substantially from order to order), items may typically be placed into shipping containers (e.g., corrugated boxes) having a wide variety of sizes, after they have been sorted into their respective orders. In some materials handling facilities, shipping containers packed with items for customer orders are routed to one of several shipping lines within the facility for final shipment preparation (e.g., protective dunnage may be added, a packing slip may be inserted, the box may be taped shut, and a shipping label may be applied). Therefore, a mix of box type and sizes may be sent to each shipping line. Throughput and/or efficiency of operations in the facility may be negatively impacted when these shipping lines must be able to handle multiple types and sizes of boxes.
While embodiments described herein by way of example for several embodiments and illustrative drawings, those skilled in the art will recognize that the embodiments not limited to the embodiments or drawings described. It should be understood, that the drawings and detailed description thereto are not intended to limit embodiments to the particular form disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope as defined by the appended claims. The headings used herein are for organizational purposes only and are not meant to be used to limit the scope of the description or the claims. As used throughout this application, the word “may” is used in a permissive sense (i.e., meaning having the potential to), rather than the mandatory sense (i.e., meaning must). Similarly, the words “include,” “including,” and “includes” mean including, but not limited to.